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The dog Gelert and the wolf may have looked very similar. But they did not treat the people around them in the same way. Today's Spotlight is on dogs and their relationship with humans.
忠犬杰乐和狼看起来很相似。但是它们对待周围的人的态度截然不同。今天的Spotlight讲述的就是狗和人类的关系。
So what made Gelert and the wolf so different? Many years ago, dogs and wolves were the same. But about 14,000 years ago, some wolves began to change. They were no longer as wild. No one knows exactly how this happened. Angus Phillips of National Geographic Magazine thinks it may have happened like this:
那么是什么让忠犬杰乐和狼有如此大的差异呢？很久以前，狗和狼一样，它们都是狼。但是在一万四千年前左右，一些狼开始改变。它们的野性没有了。没有人确切地知道为什么会这样。国家地理杂志的安格斯 菲利普斯认为大概的原因应该是这样的：
"Some wolves moved close to human cooking fires after smelling something good to eat. Then they worked to get closer to groups of humans. They did this by being helpful or proving they would not hurt people. The humans might have used the wolves' better hunting skills to help them hunt animals. The wolves could warn humans of danger at night."
一些狼闻到人类生火做饭的美味后接近了人类。通过向人类证明自己对人类并无歹心且能帮助人类，它们和人类的关系越来越密切。人类可能也觉得有这些狼也不错，因为它们有很好的捕猎能力帮助他们捕获猎物，并且能在晚上危险来临时给他们警告。
Humans and wolves both lived in groups. The groups usually had a leader. The smaller, weaker wolves knew how to obey the wolf leader. So it was easy for them to learn to obey a human leader. Both humans and these smaller wolves got something good from this relationship. Angus Phillips explains the result:
人类和狼都是群居动物。狼的族群一般都会有个头领。弱小的狼都会听命于头狼。所以它们很快就学会了听命于人类。任何这些小一点的狼在相互的关系中获益。安格斯菲利普斯解释了如下结果：
"Over thousands of years. . .humans kept the large, rough wolves out of the human camps. This led to the development of different kinds of dogs that were more friendly to people. They began to look different than wolves. . .They were generally smaller than wolves, with a shorter nose."
过了几千年......人类将那些大型而粗野的狼驱出人类的营地。许多不同种类而又对人类非常友好的狗由此发展而来。它们开始看起来和狼有了一些不同......一般来说，它们都会比狼小一些，鼻子也会比狼短一些。
Today, there are about 400 different kinds of dogs. People can see many of these kinds of dogs at dog shows. At these shows, people bring their dogs to compete for a prize. The dogs run, walk and do tricks for judges. Some of the dogs are as tall as the waist of a person. Others are small enough to be carried in one hand. Some dogs have long hair that reaches to the ground. Others have no hair at all.
如今，大约有四百多种狗。人们可以在狗类选秀节目中看到许多种类。在这些选秀节目中，人们带着他们的爱犬参加比赛并获奖。狗狗们在裁判面前又跑，又走，还会做一些技巧性动作。有些狗与人齐腰高，有些小的用一只手就可以抱起来；有些狗长毛着地，有些狗一毛不长。
Dogs can be very different in size, shape and colour. Peter Tyson works for the science magazine NOVA. He explains why there are so many kinds of dogs:
狗狗们的大小、体型和颜色有很大不同。彼得泰森在科学杂志NOVA工作。他向我们解释了为什么会有这么多种狗狗：
"There are so many kinds of dogs mainly because of human and not natural selection...Through the late 19th century, humans would mate dogs for special skills they wanted."
“有这么多狗主要是人为原因而非自然选择......整个十九世纪末期，人类都在给狗配种以让自己的狗狗们获得人类想要的技能。”
